


“Come in,” she said, “I’ll give you shelter from the storm.”

by nwhepcat



Category: Supernatural
Genre: F/M, post-5.22 "Swan Song"
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-29
Updated: 2010-07-29
Packaged: 2017-10-10 20:47:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/104111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nwhepcat/pseuds/nwhepcat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean tries to have more good days than bad. For Ben.</p>
            </blockquote>





	“Come in,” she said, “I’ll give you shelter from the storm.”

**Author's Note:**

> Sparked by a prompt from in the Kissing, Nuzzling, Wrap-You-in-My-Clothes comment fic meme.

Dean tries to have more good days than bad.

He remembers how it was when he was a kid, watching his dad put aside a newspaper that offered nothing to hunt and pour himself a stiff drink (first of many). Seeing that grief deepen the lines on his dad's face. Feeling that it was his own failure -- that he could never be enough to chase away Dad's sorrow, no matter how much he tried.

The last thing Dean wants is to lay that same burden on Ben.

Ben's a damn sharp kid. Dean's well aware the kid realizes he's different from when they met before. But after that first shellshocked week or two, Dean makes an effort. Pushing aside his grief the best he can, he sifts through memories of when he was Ben's age, the good moments he and Dad shared. Target practice, taking care of Dad's guns and knives -- those are out. _Normal things_, he tells himself. Learning how to tinker with the car, or a Sunday listening to a ballgame while making the Impala's skin and chrome shine. Always a purpose to their time together, except the rarest of occasions. Once or twice a summer they might take a drive that didn't have a monster on the other end, just ice cream cones. A trip to a swimming hole when the temps climbed so high even the evil things were like lizards burrowing under the nearest rock to find a patch of cool.

So it's hard to think of what a kid might like to do now, one who's grown up with a little more money than Dean ever had. Ben's not spoiled by any means, and he and Lisa aren't rich by any stretch of the imagination, but he's got a video game system and an iPod. Lisa takes him to the pool three times a week for lessons or swim team or something. Suggesting a game of catch seems lame, like something out of an old TV show, and most kids now would sneer at "Want to help me wash my car?"

What the fuck passes for normal these days?

One night after dinner Dean gets up to help Lisa with dishes instead of pouring himself a drink and staring at the kitschy diner clock beside the fridge. "I want to do something with Ben," he confesses, "but hell, I don't know what normal people do. My old man and I made consecrated iron bullets and packed rock salt rounds."

Pulling her hands out of the hot dishwater, Lisa turns and stares at Dean, her hands dripping suds on the floor.

"What, did I say something I shouldn't have?"

"No, it's just -- I've been wondering what fantasy of me you've had in your head that made you come to me the way you did. We had an extremely good time about ten years ago. And then a pretty hair-raising time about two years ago. I don't know why I didn't see it sooner."

Dean's lost here. "See what?"

"That your fantasy has as much or more to do with Ben as it does with me."

He takes a sudden step back, a plate nearly slipping from his hand, and he clatters it into the drainer undried. "Jesus. I swear there is _nothing_ like that on my mind. If that's what you think, I'll pack up and go."

"Dean," she says under his stammered declaration. "Dean. _Dean._"

He finally skids to a halt.

"You completely misread what I just said."

Even though Ben's in the other room, watching an action movie with the sound loud enough to drown out an atomic blast, Dean lowers his voice to a fierce whisper. "You just said I fantasize about your kid."

"I'm not talking about sexual fantasies, Dean. I mean daydreams and wishes. You like kids, that was pretty obvious when you met Ben. You're good with them. I know you had seriously mixed feelings when I told you Ben wasn't your son. And now you've been through a lot and you want a normal life, and we seem like a ready-made family. But it's not going to work."

He feels a tight fist of emotion closing in his chest. "I know I'm messed up, Lees. But I'm working at it. I thought I'd try spending some time with Ben, get out of my own head."

"And that's sweet of you," Lisa says. Wiping her hands on her jeans, she places them, still slightly damp, on Dean's chest. "You're a good man. But you're trying to force things that can't be forced."

"I'm _asking_ you. Jesus, I didn't just take Ben out hunting, I _asked_ what you thought he'd like to do."

He's fucking this up, the one thing Sammy asked him to do, and he doesn't even know how.

"That's a good impulse," Lisa says. She's trying to sound kind -- hell, maybe she does, but it's wounding him all the same. She chews at her lip a moment. "Look, if you're out in your car, and you get where you're going, do you just ram it into park while you're still moving?"

"Not unless you want to look at a shitload of repairs."

"Exactly. And I don't think you can stop hunting that way, either. There's work you have to do before you can settle into an everyday life you haven't had since you were a small kid."

"Work?"

"Grieving. Making your peace with what's happened in the last year and the last thirty."

_Work_. Right. He forgets sometimes that teaching yoga is about more than just making incredible, bendy sex possible, and comes complete with a load of spiritual bullshit too. He doesn't bother suppressing a scowl.

"Hey," she says softly, rubbing one hand gently over his chest. "What is it?"

"Grief isn't a goddamn job. It's a baseball bat that stoves your head in, and just about the time you think you can get up from that, it takes out your knees, and on and on. It's something you survive, not something you get a scout badge for."

Though he expects her to push some New Ager program on him, all Lisa says is, "Bad word choice. What I mean is, it's painful. Maybe you want to take care of yourself before you worry about taking care of Ben and me."

"But that's _how_ I deal, by taking care of other people. It's been true ever since my mom died. I carried my baby brother out of the burning house, and I watched over him ever since."

"Maybe it's time to learn a new way of handling your grief."

He can't believe she's still pushing this. "If you're giving me the goddamn bum's rush, just say so."

Sighing, Lisa turns away from Dean and puts her hands back in the soapy water. "No. I don't mind if you stay, as long as Ben does okay with it." She washes a plate, handing it toward Dean for him to rinse and dry.

Dean takes up the damp dishtowel again.

"He likes action movies, and I hate them," Lisa says, answering his question as if this whole discussion hasn't even taken place. "If you can find one that's no higher than PG-13 that checks out okay on the parents websites, I know he'd love that."

Setting the plate in the rack, he reaches for the next one. "Okay. I'll take a look at the paper, see what's on." He hasn't looked at the paper since the first couple of days after Lucifer went back in the penalty box. Once he was sure the Biblical disasters had ceased popping up daily, he found himself scanning the stories looking for a hunt. He'd promised Sam, so he made himself stop.

When she hands him the last of the pans to dry, Lisa says, "Why don't you go in and watch TV with Ben for a while. I have to pay bills and do some paperwork."

It's her reassurance that she trusts him not to fuck her kid up, Dean knows. "Sure," he says. Rummaging in the fridge, he finds a soda for Ben and a beer for himself, and heads into the living room. The boy's sprawled on the floor, too close to the TV and leaning in.

"Hey, want a Coke?"

He's too enthralled by the explosions to even notice. Dean had pictured himself watching _with_ Ben -- together on the sofa, the way he and Sam used to watch -- not sitting behind him in a darkened room, ignored.

He moves closer to Ben, where he knows he'll eventually register in his peripheral vision. "Hey, Sammy. I brought you a Coke."

Pulling his attention away from the flickering screen, Ben regards him. "You called me Sammy."

The hand with the soda can stays by Dean's side, unoffered. The sound of shit blowing up mingles with the roaring in his ears. _I can't do this._

"Dean?"

Snapping out of it, he says, "Yeah. Here." He thrusts the can toward Ben and leaves the room.

It takes less than five minutes to pack his duffel. _(Dad would be proud.)_

Neither Ben nor Lisa seems to notice when he walks out with it slung over his shoulder. When he opens the Impala's trunk, he sees Sam's duffel where it's (almost) always been, and the constant ache he's lived with these last weeks flares into something dagger-sharp.

Something like he felt in Hell.

Settling his own duffel in the trunk, he unzips Sam's, neatly packed as a duffel can be. At the top is one of those hooded sweatshirts Sam favored, spotted with bleach after a messy fight with something evil. Normally it would have been trashed instead of being washed, but it was Sam's favorite. After its dousing with bleach, Dean used to call it the Michael Jackson jacket, which would bring on the Bitch Face, but Sam still persisted in wearing it.

Tugging the sweatshirt free from Sam's duffel, Dean fingers the cotton. It's soft as he remembers Sam's baby blanket being, worn but still thick enough for warmth on a cool night. Not caring who might see, he lifts the hood to his face and inhales the scent of Sam and the slightly girly shampoo he used. His throat tightens as swiftly as if he were allergic to the smell of the shampoo.

"Dean?" Lisa's voice is gentle, concerned.

Bunching the jacket in his hands, Dean turns to face her. "Just doing the sniff test here," he rasps. He pulls the sweatshirt on as if he'd meant to all along. "I guess it'll do."

"What are you doing?" she asks. "Ben saw you carrying your stuff out here."

"Yeah, well. I figured you're right. I'm not gonna do you and Ben much good if I don't get myself straight first."

"That doesn't mean you have to leave."

Dean rubs at the back of his neck, the sweatshirt's stretched-out, ragged knit cuff half covering his hand. "Look, the last time Ben saw me, I was the cool guy who fought monsters. I'd like him to forget this version of me and go back to remembering that guy. And --" He stuffs his fists in the hoodie's pockets, stretching the shirt's hem down as he straightens his arms. "It's not fair to you. Expecting you to make that fantasy come true."

Lisa sighs. "You can't build a home in a day, and you can't create a family overnight. That's true of normal ones, and perfect ones take even longer."

"I guess."

"I _know_. You're putting way too much pressure --"

"-- on you and Ben," Dean says. "Which is why I should go."

"On yourself, is what I was going to say." Stepping toward him, she lays her hand on his cheek. "Look. Ben knows you're sad, and he knows it's nothing he caused, and nothing he can fix. You're not going to hurt him by staying and doing more of the same. I've been raising this kid alone for years. I know how to protect him and myself -- okay, maybe not against monsters, but from men who are bad for us? You have no idea. If you need to go for his sake or mine, I'll make sure you know it."

_This. This is why he came to Lisa. Not just for bendy sex or for Ben or the fantasy of a normal life and family. This strength and certainty._ Turning his face into her touch, he allows her to gather him into her arms. But as light and citrusy as her perfume is, it bothers Dean that it's overpowering the scent of Sam clinging to the sweatshirt. It's too soon to wipe out these small traces of Sam. Dean steps back, out of her embrace. "I can't right now."

She nods. "Okay then. But don't just get in your car and go roaring off. I know somebody here in town who's got a small apartment for rent above his garage. Try living there, coming to see Ben and me a few times a week for dinner or to take Ben to a ballgame or something. You and me, we could try something crazy and novel, like dating first."

Huffing a laugh, Dean says, "Let's not go overboard." But he feels an immense pressure release from his chest. "Yeah. I think that'd be good."

"Come in, then. I'll call Curt and see about the apartment, and you can say goodnight to Ben instead of running off without a word."

As Lisa turns and heads back into the house, Dean starts to remove Sam's hoodie, but instead he pulls it closer around him. He zips Sam's duffel and closes the trunk lid.

He pauses to breathe in the Sam-scent that the movement puffs toward him, lifting the faded cotton to his face.

Then he turns and follows Lisa into the house.


End file.
